Dan Price, founder and CEO of the credit card payment processing firm Gravity Payments recently proposed an unprecedented solution to financial stress within his company: a new minimum wage of $70,000.
The New York Times reported that he plans to raise the salary of all 120 of his employees, who were making an average of $48,000 a year just last week.
How is such a radical salary increase possible without raising costs for clients or cutting back on service?
Price, the New York Times reports, drives a 12-year-old-Audi and isn't much for extravagances. He told them he will slash his own salary from nearly seven figures to $70,000 in order to actualize his new definition of minimum wage. He also told the Times he plans to direct a large chunk of his company's estimated $2.2 million in profit this year towards salaries.
The well-being of his employees is more important to Price than his own pay check - a realization that surfaced after talking to some of his friends who struggle to make ends meet living off of $40,000 a year. They would be "describing a surprise rent increase or nagging credit card debt," he told the New York Times. "I hear that every single week. That just eats at me inside."
Price has made several smart decisions since breaking into the entrepreneurial world at age 19 when he started Gravity Payments from his dorm room at Seattle Pacific University - and last year he earned Entrepreneur of the Year for his incredible business success.
In an interview with the Young President's Organization after receiving the coveted award, he stated: "We're innovative in the sense that we don't do things the easy way."
That declaration could not be more true.